Catholics should welcome their persecution. That’s what Christianity is all about

Chuck Unsworth

I suspect that Blair's putting in a bid to become the next Pontiff.

But to the point - mortification is 'a good thing' to many Catholics.

salieri

It was Geoffrey Robertson (QC) actually, and how do you know he's pompous?

Nor, for the umpteenth time, has any question been begged - as opposed to raised.

And finally, why on earth should Christianity be "all about" suffering and persecution? It has had its share of them - and has inflicted them, too - but persecution hardly represents the purpose of any religion, does it? Back to theological college...

Cjamesk

I'm not religious myself but one can't help wondering what the "outrage" would be if Islam was criticised in this manner.

Just look at the news now, a burning of the Quran is now perceived as being more of a threat to the middle east than invading those Muslim countries in the first place, hypocrisy at it's finest.

Private Schultz

Who is more offensive?

Someone who professes to believe in God but lies to Parliament in order to start an illegal war that kills thousands of innocent civilians and hundreds of soldiers.

And then keeps insisting that it was 'right' to do so.

Excommunicate him.

Pot Head

Well suck it up then:

Pat Condell in fine form - http://youtu.be/LKg4HLsu5gE

Nele Schindler

Thanks for this - I wholeheartedly agree.

I've been feeling uncomfortable for a long time about the church's attempts (both Protestant and Catholic) to be 'relevant', to find a nice cushy place in a pantheon of faiths and turn into an option among many.

In that sense, I'm almost grateful for hell-and-brimstone types such as Pastor N. Utcase who brings this whole lukewarm soup to a rolling boil by burning a few Qurans.

Chris

>But, for some believers, it begs the question

As usual, it doesn't. It raises the question.

CS

I'm inspired by the Catholic Church's recent conversion to the view that persecution is a bad thing. The Church should say to all the women and the gays and the Jews and the Muslims who are currently criticising the Church: "How would you like it if the Church persecuted you? How would you like it if the Church persecuted anyone who thought differently?"

Pardon my sledgehamer irony, Father.

Tarka the Rotter

Hat tip to Jerub-Baal:

"That Bible Burning Preachers Actions in Context
As Hamas completed its conquest of Gaza last Thursday, a spokesman for the group appeared on Palestinian television and announced the “end of secularism and heresy in the Gaza Strip.”

Shortly after, a group of militants stormed the Latin Church and the adjacent Rosary Sisters School in Gaza City, reportedly using rocket-propelled grenades (RPGs) to blow through the doors.

After gaining entrance, the rampaging jihadists burned every Bible and destroyed every cross they could get their hands on before setting both buildings alight, according to sources who spoke to Israel Today."

And Hillary Clinton said...

Rhoda Klapp

What part of the gospel is actually the blueprint for the Catholic Church? Where is the Pope's remit laid out? Musta missed it.

Catesby

Rhoda Klapp

Thou art Peter and upon this rock I will build my Church and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it...

Matthew 16 13-19

Tarka the Rotter

@ Rhoda Clap

well Must(afa) certainly missed it...

Edward

Yep, I often look at how the secular liberal establishment hates your guts; and I think you've got to be doing something right.

Ronnie

Good grief Rhoda.

wrinkled weasel

You are merely witnessing the death throes of corporate, secularised Christianity in what will be seen, say 100 years hence, as an era of intense cultural revolution. But the real thing aint going to go away anytime soon.

As for Mr Blair. If only I could touch the hem of his garment.

Rhoda Klapp

Yep, as I thought, a man-made construct to exploit the masses. No bishops, no cathedrals, no priests, no pope.

I'd think the prescription for worship is the bit that goes, IIRC, 'whenever two or three are gathered together in my name...'

DavidDP

They aren't really being persecuted, come on.

The Laughing Cavalier

Please, please Freddie, say it ain't so. What on earth has this Holy man Benedict XVI done to deserve having the grinning charlatan attached to his entourage? Which idiot Bishop dreamed this up or (more likely) succumbed to Blair muscling his way into the proceedings in the same manner as he tried, and failed, to be the star turn at The Queen Mother's funeral?

TomTom

The really amusing thing is that Politics is frightened of The Church once again. The discrediting of political parties now the '68ers have finally destroyed everything leaves people looking at religion as a relief from organised criminality in politics.

Just as Muslims escape the utter depravity of political life in Muslim countries by turning to The Koran, so Westerners are looking for anything to escape from the soulless dreary PC doctrines of the Cultural Marxists who have deconstructed society to the point where little functions.

The collapsing faith in organised political structures in Germany, France, USA, Britain to name but a sample, is a sign that the 1960s have finally unwound as The West faces economic decline and possibly eclipse as energy consumption is wholly out of kilter with supply and the mass-consumption society hits the rocks of creditworthiness.

I think The Pope should be grateful. They never kick a dead dog.

William

Rhoda, these people actually think that the collection of crooks and villains they call Pope are a direct line to Peter himself - even when they had 2 Popes at once!

Trust in Christ alone.

MikeF

I have no doubt that if the result of the last election had been different then the left would have been intent on the physical disruption of the papal visit. As it is they are being a bit more circumspect and simply heaping vilification on the Pope and Catholicism. There is no surprise in this. Catholicism and Judaism are by far the two thought systems in the world that are most proof against subversion and dilution by the left. Hence the reason the left hates them. Islam, of course, is so as well but at the moment we are seeing this odd alignment of the left and radical Islam, which makes sense only when you realise that they are united in a hatred of established western societies with cultures derived from Judaeo-Christian principles.

All you can say is that if people like that odious little creep Peter Tatchell actually succeed in destroying the tolerant, socially conservative society into which they were born then they will find it is to their cost because what will follow will not be a kind of society in which minorities of any kind will be comfortable. But it is not a cost I want to pay and the time has arrived when those of us who do not share the death-wish of the left towards the society into which we were born will have to be prepared to defend it with every resource we can muster.

London Calling

Catholics should welcome their persecution. That’s what Christianity is all about…

Actually not all Christians are Catholic, in fact some of the kindest decent people I know have never set foot inside a church, they lead by example and would view any form of persecution as the embodiment of self-interest and the path to destruction.

If the pope was a true Christian he wouldn’t even contemplate visiting Britain at this time of economic woe and would instead contribute the money it would have cost for his visit to charities in the UK…

Jesus was persecuted for speaking the truth, not because he was soft on the facts…

Noa Zrk

"If the pope was a true Christian he wouldn’t even contemplate visiting Britain at this time of economic woe..."

Catholic taxpayers directly contribute to the upkeep of a morally and intellectually bankrupt Church of England and to the innumerable government grants, subsidies and awards made to mosques and Islamic centres. As such they are entitled to equality of treatment and not to 18th century levels of discrimination and thinly veiled bigotry.

Indeed the Pope's visit may remind the UK of the values and principles for which Christianity stands, rather than the failings of humans and their institutions to live up to them.

Peter From Maidstone

I am not a Catholic, but I am attending the service in Westminster Abbey on Friday and will be glad to do so. I think that the visit of Pope Benedict will be of great benefit to all traditional and orthodox Christians in the UK.

Occasional Ostrich

Taoism
Sh*t happens
Buddhism
If sh*it happens it isn’t really sh*t
Hinduism
This sh*t has happened before
Islam
This sh*t happened because it is the will of Allah
Catholicism
Because this sh*t happened you will be punished
Protestantism
Because this sh*t happened somebody else will be punished
Judaism
Why does this sh*t always happen to us?
Rastafarianism
Let’s smoke this sh*t

Unedited original seen on a t-shirt for sale in Cambridge.

Occasional Ostrich

To mis-quote Groucho Marx, "I wouldn't belong to any club that would have Tony Blair as a member."

Anne Wotana Kaye 1

I am not a Christian, but have great respect for Christianity and the culture and ethos it has contributed to this country over the centuries. The forthcoming visit of the Pope is a great historical occasion, but I have been left feeling confused by the reactions of the mainly "chattering class" in the area where I live. They are very LibDem and Green, supporting same-sex marriage etc. They profess to 'love my neighbour', which is fairly easy as they are almost all of the same ethnic class, white and middle class. They fawn on anything or anybody Islamic, because that's the PC way to be - but by jove, what venom when they discuss the Pope's forthcoming visit. All they can talk about is child abuse and more child abuse. The local papers have always been full of paedophiles, who were not Catholic priests, nor indeed priests, but they have picked on a stick to beat the Pope with, and will not let it go. I wonder if some of this hate is because inside themselves they recognise how far they have moved from their original roots , discarding the finest western standards of family, respect and general behaviour, and feel guilty and dispossessed.

Frank Sutton

Can anyone please confirm a story I heard, that TB tried to do a deal with the previous pope, to get himself canonised while still living? In other words, to become the first official earthly saint.

Noa Zrk

Frank Sutton

It was,and is, my understanding that Tony Blair considers Himself to outrank the Pope, who is merely infallible in spiritual matters, unlike Him, who is infallible in all secular matters.

Baron

“Tony Blair appears to have landed a starring role in the papal visit.’

since when does Rome welcome evil into the ranks of the faithful, ha?

Anne Wotana Kaye 1

Frank Sutton & Noa Zrk: Wrong! How can you malign an entity who has a three letter title. It starts with G and ends with D.

Noa Zrk

Anne W K.

No malign intent on my part.

I'm afraid TB Himself usurped the Supreme Being's role and identity at some time in recent memory. How else are we, despite all that has occured on His Journey, to explain His continued Ascent?

Anne Wotana Kaye 1

Noa Zrk: Metamorphosis

Noa Zrk

Anne W K

A metamorphosis indeed,perhaps He is Faust rather than God. Who though, was his Mephistopheles?

M'lady Mandy perhaps? Or Prezza? No! Wrong. playwright, wrong play...a Falstaff not a temptor. Sad Mad Gordo Macbeth? A tragedy for us not himself...

Anne Wotana Kaye 1

Noa Zrk: Mephistopheles is mentioned in "The Merry Wives of Windsor" - a terrible coven of 'wives' lead by the dreadful Cherie, could include Harriet Harman and Jackie Smith et al, ...oh dear, this is getting weird!

GeoffM

As a Catholic, when you are opposed by freaks the likes Tatchell and nasty biological units like Dawkins & Hitchens it is plain that your faith represents a greater, if uncomfortable, Truth.

We make these creatures uncomfortable as our teachings expose them, their "beliefs" and their lifestyles for what they are.

So, yes, it is no great problem to be opposed by pederasts, drunkards and the soulless.

Their opposition defines them as much as us.

Tancred

As St Edmund Campion said (of anti-Catholics), prior to being hung, drawn and quartered by Protestant zealots:-

"In condemning us, you condemn all your own ancestors, all our ancient bishops and kings, all that was once the glory of England -- the island of saints, and the most devoted child of the See of Peter."

To be opposed by pederasts, atheists and drink/drug addled journalists is fine. It shows that we have something that makes them and their lifestyle uncomfortable.

We have the Truth. They have nothing - just emptiness.

Hugh

Christians are to expect to be persecuted for their faith, not because they have been casual in responding to paedophilia in their midst.

1 Peter 4:15-16 If you suffer, it should not be as a murderer or thief or any other kind of criminal, or even as a meddler. However, if you suffer as a Christian, do not be ashamed, but praise God that you bear that name.

Fergus Pickering

Jewsus was persecuted for claiming to be the Son of God. If you don't think he was, then you must have some sympathy with his persecutors.

Noa Zrk

The problems of a religiously tolerant empire and managing diversity. Execute the leader of a lunatic religious fringe, watch the lunatics religion grow, then take over and destroy your empire, religion and beliefs.

J

You've got to expect some resistance and persecution on account of your faith -Christ never said it would be easy but that if you persevere under trials and persecution against you, you will be made heirs to the Kingdom!

AndyinBrum

So this persecution involves the head of your church being invited to tour this country, paid largely for by the non catholic taxpayers?

Also it is not persecution to suggest that the man who appears to have been the main instigator in covering up child abuse and rape by the catholic clergy, & allowing the priests to be moved to new parishes to rape & molest anew. It ain't persecution, its an attempt for justice

AndyinBrum

Ratzinga should be arrested on landing in this country

tacojhons

this is really weird

tacojohns

pot head you should really change your name